


The Thing with Feathers

by awed_frog



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Castiel Learns to be Human, Episode: s09e06 Heaven Can't Wait, Episode: s10e20 Angel Heart, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-28
Updated: 2015-04-28
Packaged: 2018-03-26 06:13:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,617
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3840109
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/awed_frog/pseuds/awed_frog
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A heart is just a heart. What matters is what one does with it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Thing with Feathers

**Author's Note:**

> I blame it all on pre-episode nerves. Because, really, I do not even know anymore. Sometimes I read beautiful metas and feel really hopeful, and then I remember all the tragedy and angst we've had so far and I think that I don't even want to see the next few episodes. Thank goodness for head!canon, because, well... 
> 
> Quotes from the _Bible_ and _Heaven can't wait_.

_I just followed the sound of your pain. You have no idea how loud it is. I could hear you for miles._

Angels do not have hearts, of course; the concept is ludicrous. Angels, in fact, do not have a physical body at all. They are light and energy and strength and devotion.

When Jimmy Novak gave over his body so that the will of God might be done, his own heart stopped beating. Castiel didn’t even notice it was there. And this is why it was the first thing to confuse him as a human - the sharp intake of air into his lungs, and the erratic tattoo of his heart inside his chest. It’d felt strange and wrong. Dangerous, even, like something out of place.

As an angel, Castiel had understood the heart, in a precise yet slightly unconcerned way, as a mechanical pump mammals and birds need the allow blood to move inside the body. He’d found it mesmerizing, and yet a telling sign of how extravagant things were actually getting. In insects, the heart was just a tube, and it performed an admirable job. Castiel had watched in fascination, but with an increased sense of amused disapproval, as life expanded and blossomed and claimed more and more place for itself. He’d looked at scales and fins and fur. He’d looked at teeth and nails and the sharp sophistication of the primate brain. He’d seen a new breed of mammals emerge, he’d felt the wave of divine love surrounding them, and he’d followed these new tribes as they wandered through the savannah, hunting and foraging, protecting their young, teaching them; using tools, sewing clothes. He was there when they carved and baked their first vessels, and when their burrows turned into homes - a long and tentative path, and yet man walked along this path, and his step were not hampered; he ran, and his feet did not stumble. 

And so his Father’s most recent creation had walked and run, and Castiel had frowned, and then he had marvelled. He had stood behind a lean, dark-haired man as he crushed stones and leaves in a wooden bowl. He had still been watching when the man had carried his precious cargo to a nearby cave, had closed his eyes in prayer as his fingers touched the paint, and had started to draw.

Bisons, horses, deer. Geometric patterns. Handprints.

The man was telling a story, and even if he’d believed himself possessed by the cave gods, he was doing it all on his own - Castiel had checked, because it had seemed so incredible. A miracle. And yet, God had not intervened. The man was creating a new world, alone.

And from that point, Castiel had been fascinated by the human race. He’d taken to spend more and more time on Earth, away from his brothers and sisters, watching humans as they fought and bled and loved and told stories to each other. 

But for a long time, hearts had been just hearts. Just another organ. Castiel had watched as the first physicians cut bodies open, peered inside them in fascination, drew diagrams and debated hotly among them as to how, exactly, the human animal worked.

And still, a heart was a heart.

Until, all of a sudden, it wasn’t. Until men started to mention hearts in songs and poetry, bestowing on them the wondrous task of creating emotions: fear, doubt. _Love._

Castiel knew then the time had come for him return to Heaven, because these songs stirred something new inside him. He found himself wondering - even when he knew it was a ridiculous idea, a fancy - if hearts were what set humans apart. If he, Castiel, could not fully understand, let alone experience, these feelings because he lacked this one vital organ. Because as an angel, he could become wind and thunder and the roaring sea itself, but this, this he could not do. He was never afraid, he did not doubt, and could not love.

But God had not wanted him to feel what the humans felt. Angels were created to serve. And so Castiel spread his wings and abandoned the kingdoms of men - their handwritten manuscripts and their cathedrals of stone and coloured glass reaching up to the heavens - their petty wars and all-consuming passions. He went back, and sat in his garden, and tried to be content, since it was not his duty to be happy.

Time turned around him in a pinwheel of blues and pinks, until one day Raphael came to him. Castiel's services were needed. He was to lead his garrison in the darkest pits of hell, to rescue one human - because God commanded it. It seemed senseless, and many would die.

Castiel asked but one question.

“How will I recognize him?”

“You will recognize him,” was Raphael’s answer; and Castiel spread his wings and took flight.

Castiel still remembers now, will remember his whole life, how it felt to lay eyes on Dean Winchester for the first time. The blinding white light of his soul, pure and whole despite the filth surrounding it. And, most of all, this new tingling somewhere in Castiel’s consciousness, reacting to it. The soul was calling out to him, and Castiel felt himself respond - and he beat his wings once, almost violently, stopping in mid-air, because there, right there, was something he’d never experienced before - he’d felt - he’d felt _something_ , a new and vague flutter of feeling, an emotion he could not fully understand. He assumed then there must be something foreign within himself, and yet it felt familiar, it felt - it _felt_ -

And later, Castiel had been so eager to try and deepen the sensation, to allow it to touch his being again, that he’d almost killed Dean Winchester while trying to get closer to him. He’d left those dwellings in icy determination, he’d searched far and wide for a vessel - and just as he was possessing it, as he was looking out at the world through human eyes for the first time in nearly two millennia, he’d heard Dean Winchester’s voice calling out to him, and had rejoiced, without knowing that it was joy he was feeling.

Years had gone by as he learned how to be close to Dean, how to watch him and talk to him without spooking him, without making him angry or scared or irritated or any one of those other human feelings Castiel still couldn’t understand. It had been a slow, careful dance between two beings who did not share a common language. Years had gone by, and still Castiel had felt those new emotions grow and bloom inside him, taking shape into something heavy and cherished, something saying, _I will protect Dean, I will not hurt Dean_ \- and through all that, a heart was just a heart. And his was even less than that, since it wasn’t beating at all, not even when Dean was in danger, not even when he looked at Castiel in frustration and disappointment. Not even when he licked his lips and looked away.

Castiel died and was reborn and died again. He stumbled inside his own mind like a drunk, seeking God’s will and presence, hiding from it. Talking to Lucifer, silencing Lucifer. Trying to appease the unruly music of his own light and thunder by turning to bees and tides and the quiet noise of falling snow.

It didn’t work. Castiel disappeared from himself again, and woke up in Purgatory, all of his being and consciousness stripped bare again except from this one fundamental thing. _I will protect Dean. I will not hurt Dean._

Castiel killed and fought day after day, this one imperative guiding him forward, until one morning he raised his head and Dean was there, smiling at him, his soul bright and blinding even in the desolation of Purgatory.

And still, his heart was still.

And so Castiel pushed Dean to safety and died and again he was reborn. 

This time he was brought back as a new creature, something pure and whole and completely empty. A perfect vessel to be filled with the word of God.

But God was not there anymore, and Dean needed him, and Castiel woke up, and stepped into himself again.

And when his heart finally started beating, Castiel looked up at the white ceiling and felt a wave of wide, unthinkable things rush down on him and drown him. He had been remade, yet again, as a creature with no awareness of why anything felt the way it felt - he’d plummeted to earth, his wings burning and falling off - he’d wandered as if through a desert, his eyes blind, his ears deaf, and yet he could see and hear as never before - _why this confusion_ , he’d thought, _which feels like it’s a hair’s breadth from terror or pain?_

When he saw Dean again, though, he understood all the songs and all the poetry. He understood the sudden tightening in his chest, that almost-sorrow and almost-longing, the desire to close his fingers over Dean’s and never let go. 

_The part of you that overreacted? That cares so much? That’s what makes you special._

His heart had awoken, it was beating for the first time, and it was beating fastest when Dean was near him. And finally, finally Castiel _understood_. He knew now that fear, doubt - _love_ \- these were weaknesses, but also strengths. That caring did not make him lacking; it made him _worthy_. And that caring for Dean, _loving_ Dean, was its own reward. 

And when he awoke as an angel again, Castiel closed his eyes and took a deep breath and simply willed his heart to keep beating. For himself, and for Dean.


End file.
